Thunderbirds Are GO

When it premiered in 1964, "Thunderbirds" became Gerry Anderson's most successful series (and remains the jewel in the Anderson crown to this day); its popularity was such that after the second shorter series - 26 episodes were produced in 1964, followed by a further six episodes in 1966 - a pair of feature films were made for the big screen. Unlike a lot of movies to come from TV shows (like "Mission Impossible Vs. The Mob," which was the two-part story "The Council" given a theatrical release), they were real movies, but they were never as popular as the source.

"Thunderbirds Are GO," the first of the two, deals with a manned mission to Mars which the Hood (International Rescue's recurring nemesis) tries to sabotage, but our heroes give the astronauts help both going there and on the return journey. The model work and special effects remain impressive, but Scott, Gordon, Alan, Gordon and John never defeat their real foes this time around:

1. With or without his wife Sylvia, Gerry Anderson's strengths were never in the writing department, and to his credit he knew it, which was why apart from the pilot episodes of his shows (and a few exceptions, such as the entire second season of "Supercar" and a couple of episodes of "Stingray") he left the actual writing to the likes of Dennis Spooner, Tony Barwick, Donald James et al. But he and the missus wrote the movie, and the weak pacing and terrible dialogue hobble the tale.

2. The movie's second act is an endless dream sequence (a staple of most Anderson shows - though tellingly, never of "Thunderbirds") featuring Alan Tracy, the most whiny and least appealing of the brothers. This is a three-time loser: it serves no real purpose outside of padding the running time, it stops the movie dead in its tracks in a manner not seen again until the Michael Jackson song in "Free Willy 2," and it provides the movie's official low point - an awful song from Cliff Richard (er, "Cliff Richard Jr.") and the Shadows, with a music video to boot!

All Gerry Anderson/"Thunderbirds" fans should see this movie once, and then go back to the previous 32 stories. (But the live-action military band performing the theme music at the end is a nice touch.)

WOWZERS!!! What a classic of sixties cinema silliness! TV's Thunderbirds are brought to the screen for a feature-length outing complete with goofy anonymous foreign perpetrators, bizarre dialog and lots of flying animated toys! This is a film that really should be seen at least once by everybody interested in film-making. Before I discuss the plot, let's talk about what the film is really about. Because the plot is just a distraction. This film is about making a film with marionettes and toys in the place of actors and special effects. Now, before you close your browser and head to Blockbuster to NOT RENT Thunderbirds, think about this - the film-makers, improbably, ACTUALLY PULL IT OFF! This film is entertaining and watchable, but more for its inventiveness and experimentalism than anything else.

The plot is honestly not worth discussing, and would have made for a truly awful film had it not been done with puppets and toys. It is a purely fantasy vision of the 21st century, though some of the technology used in it is no less ridiculous than - say - that which appeared in Star Trek Voyager. If you've seen the Thunderbirds TV show you already know exactly what to expect, and this film really amounts to two or three episodes stitched together with a very fine thread. Basically, the Thuderbirds are a family (all boys, of course, one has to wonder how they reproduced), and a couple of mystery women (one is an elegant but unpretty female James Bond type, and the other seems to serve no real purpose) who live in and run an International security base, and have incredible technical and piloting skills, allowing them to carry out very dangerous aerial missions at very high speed (it helps that they are made of wood, I guess). The central plot, if there is one, involves NASA's first manned space flight to Mars and two attempts (one sabotaged by a very unpleasant looking spy) and the second ... well... I won't spoil it. Of course, it's the Thunderbirds to the rescue in both cases.

As a rule, I do not like masks, elaborate costumes and puppets. In fact, I remember despising the Thunderbirds TV show when I was a very young hardcore sci fi fan, because of the scary bobbleheaded characters and the poor use of the sci-fi genre. I was too young to understand what was really going on. What saves this film for me today is its very good sense of aesthetics. The sets are interesting and detailed. Even the monsters (occupying a very short segment about 2/3rds of the way through) are innovative and interesting. Despite the fact that the special effects are ridiculous, you keep watching because its fascinating to see how the film-makers accomplish each effect. You also keep watching because even though the voice talent is unrelentingly average the animated marionettes manage to do better body language than many contemporary flesh and blood actors.

I am not sure Thunderbirds is a film I will see again, but I am glad I saw it once.

The space race continues with the first manned mission to Mars in the shape of the Zero-X. However things are put back when the Zero-X is sabotaged during take-off and crashes. Two years later the team are ready to try again but fears over security give them pause. With the Thunderbird team on standby, the mission goes ahead but can the Tracey family help make the perilous mission a success.

With the live-action remake hitting the cinemas, I decided to avoid the kids in the cinema by watching this original feature instead. Those complaining about how the remake is not any good because of the fact that Anderson was not hands-on involved should perhaps check this out as it is proof that a feature-length version of the series was not any easier for the creator himself! I sat to this just content to see those great ships used well in a reasonable story but, I'm sad to say, that I didn't even get that. The film leaves it for about 20 minutes before the Thunderbirds even get involved and then they only really do anything of merit in the final 10 minutes. In terms of actual good content, I reckon you could have got an episode out of this easily enough but no more than that – and that's the problem. The plot is padded at the start with a very slow take off of Zero-X, in the middle with a terrible dream sequence and towards the end with a laughable mission on Mars!

The Andersons' are entirely to blame because they wrote the script themselves and produced a padding piece of nonsense that lacks any sense of excitement, pace or, god help us, fun! The dream sequence is a good example – a silly, overlong section that only pads the film and exposes us to Cliff Richard and the Shadows; however the actual mission to Mars is equally as bad with aliens being settled on for the reason a rescue is needed at the end (however the aspect of flame-throwing aliens on Mars is not even mentioned after this scene!). This is the film's great failing, it just cannot sustain the running time at all and most of the time it is very apparent padding that only frustrates – personally I think anyone else could have come up with a better plot for the film that would have seen more rescues and use of the Thunderbird ships. It is annoying because, as a child, I used to watch the show and I think the ships and the models were all cool however they were all very poorly used and most of the screen time seemed to be given over to the anonymous crew of the Zero-X and Lady Penelope.

The cast do reasonable voice work but never manage to bring emotion to their delivery – something that could really have helped the poor story get a bit of tension into it. Although the song is awful, it is at least momentarily amusing to see puppets of Cliff Richard and the Shadows but, let me stress, it's only momentarily amusing. The only other voice of note is that of the late Bob Monkhouse, but he has little to do and it's one you have to listen for to catch it.

Overall, even fans of the series will feel let down by this film. It is full of ineffective padding and essentially relegates the all-action thunderbirds into third place in their own movie! The writing is awful and will send fans rushing back to their boxsets and will leave the rest of the viewers reaching for the remote control. A very poor film in the place of what should have been a cool, breezy and fun big screen outing for fans.

I grew up on Thunderbirds repeats as a kid. The excitement, the explosions, the majestic Barry Gray scores... It was a wonderful programme. Even now I have a great soft spot for it and own the whole series on DVD. Though the episodes now seem quite padded here and there and I watch it with much more cynicism than I did as a child, I still love it. A good episode of Thunderbirds is the perfect nostalgia trip for me.

Sad to say, then, that the Thunderbirds movies retain little of the qualities that made the TV show such great fun. Perhaps it's the script: Gerry and Sylvia Anderson were far better leaving the scripting duties to other writers as they couldn't write decent dialogue for peanuts. They wrote Thunderbirds' debut episode, which has awful expository dialogue and lots of pointless sequences that go nowhere - but the episode as a whole is still a classic due to the frenetic atmosphere, the sense of doom and the fantastically imaginative rescue (it's the episode where the Fireflash plane lands on three little buggies). "Thunderbirds are Go!" is just horrendously boring. The first ten minutes are taken up with the Zero-X ship being assembled. Very slowly. Later on we have a long dream sequence where Alan imagines going out for a date with Lady Penelope, which features Cliff Richard and the gang having a sing-song (a musical segment in a Thunderbirds movie - what were they thinking?!) and the entire subplot of what the Zero-X astronauts get up to on Mars has no bearing on International Rescue at all.

The Tracy brothers get hardly anything to do in their own film (John, as is customary, has about 5 lines of dialogue, and Gordon just sits about looking glum - even everybody's favourite, Virgil, has barely any screen time at all). Nor, in fact, are the Thunderbird craft used all that often. In 100 minutes of film there's only one real rescue (featuring Thunderbird 2), with IR overseeing operations at the beginning of the film - which involves them sitting around and peering contentedly at control panels. You'd think with 100 minutes - double the length of one of the TV episodes - the Andersons could've plotted loads of thrilling situations and rescues that involved all the Tracy brothers and their Thunderbird machines, but it was not to be. Thunderbirds 1 and 3 swoop about for a few seconds. Thunderbird 4 isn't even in it (despite being on the DVD cover). Nor are the pod vehicles present - couldn't we even have had the Mole drilling away at something? It really is a tedious film. And that's not even mentioning Alan Tracy ignoring his girlfriend, Tin-Tin, and fantasising about Lady P instead. Way to be a good role-model for the kiddies, Alan. Then again he was a snot in the telly series too...

Maybe I'm being too hard on what is meant to be an inoffensive kids' film featuring explosions and great model work. But then again the TV show was a genuinely exciting and exhilarating programme, which, at its best, provided great entertainment. "Thunderbirds are Go!" has an uneventful plot, awful dialogue, no decent set-pieces, and - the cardinal sin - a boring rescue that doesn't even utilise the Thunderbird craft to the best of their abilities. It's difficult to imagine kids being wowed by it. You'd be far better off going back to the telly series. Show your kids the Fireflash episodes, or that brill one where giant alligators attacked a manor house. Heck, show them the daft one where Parker encouraged everybody to play bingo for half an hour. Both younger viewers and adults looking for warm nostalgia will be disappointed with "Thunderbirds are Go!" Avoid.

I remember back in the 1960s the family were out for a walk and we were passing a cinema. We had nothing else to do, so we went in to see this. I had never been particularly impressed with the TV version in black and white (at that time in Britain). But I was very impressed with the film. In full glorious colour, and the special effects looked highly realistic on the big screen - they really did.

It's kids' entertainment for children aged from 7 to 700. The fact it lasted longer than a TV episode doesn't matter.

You get a great exciting story, lots of journeys into space in a blistering adventure that'll steam up Brains's glasses and set his bow tie spinning.

Saw the film again recently, this time with the eyes of an adult. Saw the dream sequence set in the night club. I was amazed at the attention to detail with The Shadows. Not only was each puppet almost a perfect model of Hank, Bruce, John and Brian, but the little Burns guitars were perfect in every detail, right down to the trade mark scroll head. Beautifully done. The singer was Cliff Richard Junior. Oh, well, you can't get everything right!